Recruitment and Retention Strategies for Mental Health
Professionals

By some estimates, psychiatrist shortages are north of 40,000
physicians, more than currently practice in the United States. The
shortage will be exacerbated by a flood of newly-insured patients
through the ACA, the aging of the Baby Boomer generation and the
aging of the psychiatrist population. Therefore, a strong
recruitment and retention strategy is paramount to maintaining a
stable mental health staff.

Avoid burn out
Studies have shown that physician burn out results in markedly
lower patient satisfaction scores. Although the temptation may be
to mitigate a mental health worker shortage by squeezing everything
you can out of limited human resources, this can backfire in the
long term. Make sure to leverage use of advanced practice
professionals, temporary help and technology to keep your staff
from overwork and burn out.

Use temporary staff
Temporary physicians and advanced practice professionals can help
supplement a staff that is spread too thin, allowing them to take
needed vacations or reducing their call hours or just filling a
long-term vacancy. Temporary or locum tenens physicians and nurses
are often accustomed to adjusting to a new job setting and hitting
the ground running very quickly. Because the cost of malpractice
insurance, payroll taxes, benefits, etc. are included in their
daily rate, the cost of locum tenens physicians and nurses is
comparable to permanent medical staff. Also, Medicare and many
commercial insurers allow you to bill for services performed by
temporary staff under the permanent physician's ID.

Leverage technology
Telepsychiatry has been around for decades, and it is gaining
ground around the country. If you are having difficulty recruiting
mental health workers to your location, you may benefit from
offering telepsychiatry, allowing you to expand your search
nationwide. A telepsychiatrist must be licensed in the state where
your patients are located, but he or she can physically be located
anywhere in the country or the world. Medicare and Medicaid allow
billing for telemedicine services that would be covered if they
were performed in person. Currently 14 states mandate that
commercial insurers cover telemedicine.

Telepsychiatry can allow you to more easily fill part-time
positions, where a mental health professional may divide his or her
time between two or more clinics or hospitals. When you can use
telepsychiatry to stay staffed up, you will prevent burn out,
increase staff satisfaction and ultimately improve your retention
rate. Telepsychiatry can be seen as an important lifestyle benefit
for mental health workers, who will appreciate the reduction in
commute hours, the ability to work from their preferred city or
state and the flexibility to travel without impacting their work
load and productivity.

Stay current on compensation benchmark
data
Make sure to stay current on what other inpatient and outpatient
facilities are paying their mental health workers. Look not only at
state and national trends but local ones as well. Keep tabs on what
government employers are doing as well. The market rate for
psychiatrists in California was unintentionally driven up
significantly by government hiring, when a new law took effect
mandating minimum staffing levels in prisons, causing a ripple
effect across all sectors.

Although the mental health worker shortage is bad and getting
worse, you can mitigate its effects with a strong recruitment and
retention strategy.